Re:Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming langu...
by gumby on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @06:43PM
(#39377172)
It's exactly how you would do the calculation if you ran it by hand, unlike the regular algebraic notation. I am flabbergasted that anyone uses the latter, especially as for most of the history of mathematics calculation was done by hand!
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Re:Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming langu...
by svachalek on Wednesday February 14, 2024 @06:57PM
(#39377282)
I don't "run" x 2 ^ by hand and I don't think anyone does. Some people find different notations more intuitive and that's fine but whether it's prefix postfix or infix, it's still an abstraction.
Re:Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming langu...
by gumby on Thursday February 15, 2024 @01:00AM
(#39379605)
> I don't "run" x 2 ^ by hand and I don't think anyone does
Of course everyone evaluates expressions symbolically: in code review, when debugging, even when looking over an expression just after typing it to make sure it’s right.
Re:Why is Common Lisp not the most popular programming langu...
by SR2Z on Thursday February 15, 2024 @12:40PM
(#39385642)
Many languages have different verb order - English is notionally SVO (subject-verb-object), while Hindi is SOV.
That is probably much more related to why we use prefix/infix/postfix notation: because it maps to our native languages better.